perfect time of day.

hmm i thought there were buttons to change font and colour and all that? where did they go. how very strange. oh well!

hey guys aren't you glad; we got through the wholllleeee trip-science-test week! now its friday! yay!

ok. well the reason i'm posting is cos tomorrow i have combined cell.. and its this time where all the youth gather together to have a service of sorts. yes. anyway! my youth worker asked me to share about how God has worked in my life recently. and i'm really quite scared. i don't really like public speaking. my mouth goes all blahlbl46ut03w46t-ish and the words don't make sense. and i was complaining about it to my friend, and this is what i was told:
"don't worry
just know you'll be such an encouragement to those ard you! know that going up there to share.. will be what those listening will hold on to for a week and be a reminder to them of how great out God is! what a blessing it is to be an encouragement!"

rather good advice eh? :) so! i decided to share what i'm gonna say tomorrow, today! here goes.


on the 8th of feb ( i remember only cos i looked at my phone today and read the sms again ) my youth worker, Pat, met me in the afternoon after school ( i think it was a wed or thursday ) for no apparent reason except to have fellowship together. yeap. so we talked, and she asked me about prayer requests and what God meant to me and how he has changed my life and how i want my life to be changed by God at the end of 2006, stuff like that. eventually i ended up pouring practically my life story out to her. haha. and she prayed for me... we prayed with conviction that my dad was going to change. that he was going to see the Light, and see God. that my mum would do the same. that my dad would get out of the depression and find out who You are. and things will be more loving, things will be alright within the family. and that i would be able to show God to them, as well as in daily life, among other things.

then 3 days later, on a sat, i was supposed to go to combined cell after i went for the musical rehearsal. but my parents stopped me, because they were concerned about my studies. they blamed my dropping of physics and sleeping late nights on church, saying how it was cos i spent too much time going to church that i had trouble with my studies. of course i was angry. i've never liked being controlled. haha. anyway. as i was fuming away i also realised that this was the first time that my parents were actually outrightly stopping me from going to church. and if this was the first time, it would happen again and again. they had been getting increasingly disgruntled about my church going, and often complained and asked why i had to go, but they never barred me directly. so i was worried. then i remembered Pat's prayer.. and i was assured that God would be able to change things.

i'm not sure if it was the sunday right after that ( i have a big problem with remembering stuff in chronological order ) but auntie janet, kelly's mum, handed me a few fliers on Alpha. its this introductory course on christianity that is conducted in quite a few churches. she asked me to ask my parents. and i was really apprehensive.. actually i think it WAS the sunday right after sat. haha meaning the day after sat. ok. anyway. i was really.. nervous about asking my parents. i knew that that was what God wanted, that i was going to do it eventually, that this was the first step if i ever wanted them saved. but it was so hard! cos my dad is a downright atheist. a few mths ago in nov i think, i had this arguement with him about christianity. i am digressing here but i hope you don't mind.. if not you know. don't read the whole thing lah. haha. he was talking about how he saw me going to the wrong path, and that i was an extreme christian, and he needed to stop me and prevent me from going down the wrong way as all the churches had brainwashed me psychologically.. or something like that. and i had to answer his questions about who is God and why i believed in Him. do you know how absolutely terrifying it is to say to your non-believing father that 'i love God', when he thinks God does not exist and that you are completely wacko and that this is evidence of how he needs to save me. funny, actually. i think i need to save him and he thinks he needs to save me. anyway there was a whole lot to that arguement, and after that he mentioned things like that more often.

so yes! -paragraphs are here so you don't get an eyesore- i was really afraid. but i prayed and prayed and decided to show the card to my mother. oh, i forgot to tell you about my mother. she is a buddhist by tradition, meaning she only follows the customs as her parents did the same. she doesn't really believe in it, but doesn't have a choice as it is the only way of having hope in something. but generally she is more accepting of christianity. so i showed it to her.. and naturally my dad saw it. and guess what!!!
THEY DECIDED TO GO!!!!!
i tell you, that was one of the happiest days of my life.
praise God right not?!?!! yes!!! thanh had also decided to go! which i was very happy about, cos it was something i had been praying for for very long. yeah so they came.. but they didn't sign up. thanh did though! but my parents didn't. my dad said 'he had no patience for all these kinda things' and my mum.. she follows my dad. but the good thing is, they weren't angry or negative in any way while going home. they actually enjoyed spending time with the church people. and my mum sat through it. i believe God was letting them know that there ARE people out there who aren't out to harm you, who aren't hypocritical, that there can be friends who genuinely care for you, and at the same time stirring my mum's heart.

by the way God has really been working in Thanh, and i am confident that she will turn to Him one day! :)

even though they didn't sign up, they were less hostile towards me going to church from that day on! and my mother has showed signs of interest. :) so i'll just keep Praying Until Something Happens!

the next week, which was last week, my father told me that he was going into IMH. that's the institute of mental health, no he is not insane!!! he was going there to quit smoking and alcohol!!! there was a pt last year where he wanted to go there to treat his depression. but not the point. the point is, this was something that had been bugging our family for a very long time! there was this point in time last year.. where, i remember blogging about it, he was drinking beer like water. and it would make me so sad, just looking at him, cos he'd simply smoke, drink, watch tv, play freecell on the computer, and stare sadly into space every day. and because no human being is meant to live such a life, he was so free that he made a big deal out of small things, because there was nothing else to think about. so it was rather hard living with him.. and there were instances where it felt like i was living in an asylum. but the thing is, God helped him!!! i was so happy! he was going into the place for 3 weeks.

however, before he could, he got admitted into the hospital. he just got admitted, actually. on tuesday. he got admitted as he went to the hospital for a checkup cos he was feeling unwell the whole day, and they found out that the amt of alcohol in him was astounding. something about the normal GGT alcohol level being 90 and his being 400. donno lah. so i was a little upset.. cos i knew that if he were admitted for rather long it would his disrupt his entry into the halfway house. what more, the patient staying in the same room as him told him not to go for the detoxification as the people there would be so stressed after not taking alcohol and not smoking that they would go around acting crazy and beating people. ( i know i'm saying this in a very odd manner.. but it is scary, if you think about it. ) so my dad became hesitant about going in, and had to think about it. and my dad's the SUPER fickle kind of guy. so although i was worried at first, i somehow had the peace of God in me. God was telling me that it was simply the devil's way of working, and discouraging. and i knew that He was behind me and we could overcome silly satan!

so with the power of God, my dad went into the detoxification place today. :) he'll be back in three weeks... hopefully alcohol and smoke free!!!

this is of course not my whole life story lah. but these are the main details about how God is so actively CHANGING lives!!!
He CAN and WILL make MIRACLES in your life, if you let Him. hopefully this has been an encouragement to all of you.. mind you it was quite hard typing this ok. i dont think many of you have heard it before. so anyway.

God bless, everyone!

love, char.